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 WATERSON

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WATERSON

pounds. Patrick Walshe (1551-79), the next bishop, has been the subject of much controversy; he was certainly consecrated by royal mandate. On tlie other hand, from the fact that he was not deposed in Mary's reign and from the appearance of his name in the provision of his successor, it is evident that he was regarded as orthodox. We may take it that he received absokition from Cardinal Pole. However he may have temporized, his orthodoxy further appears from his consistent patronage of Dean Peter Wliite, the greatest pedagogue of his day, and the most strenuous opponent of royal supremacy.

From the death of Walshe, for full half a century the diocese was administered by vicars only. Some years previously Archbishop Walsh of Cashel, a native of

The Catholic Cathedral, Watebford

Waterford, had advised the Holy See that one arch- bishop and at most two bishops would be enough for Munster. James White, the daring ecclesiastic who reconciled the Waterford churches on the death of Elizabeth and confronted Mountjoy when the latter came to chastise the city, was named vicar Apostolic upon the bishop's death. James White was brother to Father Stephen White, S.J. (Polyhislor), and to Father Thomas W^hite, S.J., founder of the Irish College of Salamanca. Twice again within the .seventeenth century had the Holy See to revert to government of the diocese by vicars: from 1652 to 1671 and from 1693 to 1696. From 1677 to 1693 the affairs of tlie diocese were administered directly by the Archbishop of Cashel. For the first thirty-six years of the eighteenth century there was no resident bishop. The de facto bishop, who was an exile for thirty-five years, governed through vicars; he was Richard Pierce, once military or court chaplain in the service of King James, and, in the years of his exile, coadjutor to the Archbisliop of >Sens.

John Brenan was bishop from 1671 to 1693, and became metropolitan in 1677, retaining the adminis- tration of Waterford. Patrick (De Angelis) Comer- ford (1629-52) wa.s an Augustinian; he sat in the Supreme Council and died an exile at Nantes. Syl- vester Lloyd (1739-48), a Franciscan (translated from Killaloe), has left two catechetical works, one in Irish and English, and the other, in two volumes jjublishcd in London, is a translation of the great Catechism of Montpellier. Bishop William Egan (1774-96), while yet parish priest of Clonmel, W!is author of a jiampldet on the piipal practice or right of nominating in certain ca.ses to vacant pari.shes in Ire- land, .-md Renehan insinuates that Kgaii's criticism of theriglit in tiuestidii led to its abandonment. Bishop lOgan was consecrated by stealth and before daylight at Taghmon, whereas his successor, Thomas Hussey

(1797-1803), was accorded a military guard of honour on the occasion of his consecration in old Adam and Eve's Chapel, Dublin. Hussey, who had been chap- lain to the Spanish Embassy and later president of Maynooth College, was a persona grata with the government and a confidant of British statesmen. Burke's correspondence with him is still extant, but un- published. John Power was bishop, 1804-17; Robert Walshe, 1817-21; Patrick Kelly (transferred from Vir- ginia, U.S. A.), 1822-29; William .\braham, 1830-37; Nicholas Foran, 1837-55; Dominic O'Brien, 1855-73; John Power (the second), 1873-87; Pierse Power, 1887-89; John Egan, 1890-91; Richard Alphonsus Sheehan, cons. 31 Jan., 1892.

The history of the diocese embraces four distinct epochs: (a) the Celtic Chiu-ch; (b) the Anglo-Irish Church; (c) the penal days; and (d) the modern revival. In the glory of the Irish Church during the first and third of these periods, Waterford and Lis- more — especially Lismore — has had its full share. Some saints associated with the Decies during the Celtic period are: Ita; Finian the leper, and another Finian; Molua; Aileran; Molaise; two Aedhs; several Colmans; Kieran of Tubrid; Celsus of Armagh (buried in Lismore); Christian O'Connery, Bishop of Lismore and papal legate; etc. In the Danish wars the churches and monasteries along the Blackwater and up to Lismore suffered severely, and several of their religious were martjTed. In the penal period Waterford produced a number of great ecclesiastics and scholars: Peter Lombard; Luke Wadding, O.M., and four other Waddings, his kinsmen, soil.: Ambrose, Luke, Peter, and Michael, of the Societv of Jesus; Paul Sherlock, S. J.; Stephen White, S.J.; "Thomas Walsh, Archbishop of Cashel; Dr. Geoffrey Keating.

Anruils of the Four Masters; Acta SS,; Brady, Episcopal Suc- cession (Rome, 1876) ; Bubke, Hist, of Clonmel (Waterford. 1907) ; Bury, Todd, and Healt, Life of St, Patrick (London, 190.5: Dut>- lin, 1864, and 1905, respectively); Colgan, Acta, etc. (Louvain, 1645): Hayman, The Annals of Lismore in The Reliquary (Jan., 1864) : Keating, History of Ireland, Irish Texts Society (London, 1902-08) : King, Memoir Introductory to the Early History of the Primates of Armagh (Armagtl, 1S54): Liber Visitationis Regalis (MS. T. C. D.) and other Visitations: Manx, History of the Church of Ireland (London, 1840) : Plummer, Vita; Sanctorum Hibernice (0.-5ford, 1910); Reeves, Adamnan's Columba (Dublin, 1857); Henbban, Collection of MSS, {Maynooth College); Smith, .4n- cient and Present state of Waterford (Dublin, 1746); Stokes, Mar- tyrology of Gorman (London, 1S95); Ware, Bishops; Waterford Archmlogical Society Journal^ etc. (Waterford, 1895-1912).

P. POWEK.

Waterson, Edward, Venerable, b. at London;

martjTed at Newcastle-on-Tyne, 7 Jan., 1594 (1593 old style). A romantic episode marks this mart>T-'s early career, for as a young man he travelled to Tur- key with some English merchants, and attracted the attention of a wealthy Turk, who offered him his daughter in marriage if he would embrace Moslemism. Rejecting the offer with horror, Edward Waterson returned westward through Italy and, coming to Rome, was there reconciled to the Catholic Church by Richard Smith, afterwards Bishop of Chalcedon. The Pilgrim-book of the English College records his stay there, 29 Nov .-11 Dec, 1.588. He then went to Reims to study for the priesthood, arriving there 24 Jan., 1,589. He received the tonsure and minor orders on 18 Aug., 1.590, subdi.aconate on 21 Sept., 1591, diaconate on 24 Feb., 1592, and the priesthood 11 March following. On 24 June he returned to England, with such zeal for the mission that he declared to his companions that if he might have the Kingdom of France to stay there till the next mid- summer he would rather choose to go to England. Though he was not learned, his humility, spirit of penance, and other virtues caused him to be regarded as a pattern. Captured at midsummer, 159.S, he was cruelly treated in prison till his execution. Incidents occurred at the martyrdom of a miraculous nature. The horses were imable to drag the hurdle to the scaffold and the ladder was mysteriously agitated by